Beyond Iconic

A master class on life, a portrait of a life fully realized: BEYOND ICONIC introduces Dennis Stock in his own words and through hundreds of his famous photographs, which include images from the Golden Age of Hollywood and Jazz, hippies, the American social landscape, architecture, landscapes and nature.

James Dean walks down Broadway, his shoulders hunched against the drizzle. The greatest legends of jazz, from Louis Armstrong to the cool Miles Davis, are caught in some of their most passionate or private moments. Epitomizing the spirit of 1960’s counter-culture, a hippie plays a flute as he walks along, all his earthly belongings in a back-pack. Lost in her own thoughts for a moment, Audrey Hepburn sits pensive between takes. Images capture the subdued beauty of a Provence winter. Like an abstract painting, the sun appears as a point of light behind a window coated thickly with frost. All of these images came from the eye, mind and camera of Dennis Stock (1928-2010), one of the most influential chroniclers of the late 20th century.The film brings us into Stock’s photography workshop shortly before his recent death in 2010. It also provides an in-depth look at his brilliant photography, his colorful and adventurous life, and his brassy personality, while not failing to examine the issues of photography as a social force and art form, America then-and-now, art education, and the meaning of creative integrity. The film’s score is the work of composer/musician duo, John Menegon and Teri Roiger. All music was recorded in their Marbletown studio, Upland Studios.